Working with Adolescents and Their Families in Eating Disorder Treatment
EDRD Pro Members save an additional $100. Become a member today.

An updated version from our previously-released course on working with adolescents and utilizing and FBT-Informed approach to eating disorder treatment. Instructed by a seasoned therapist and dietitian team, this course will provide dietitians with a complete and comprehensive understanding of what Family Based Treatment (FBT) is and how RDNs can utilize FBT in their work with treating adolescents with eating disorders. The course places attention on updates to the research, addressing the needs of various special populations, and an intentional weight-inclusive approach to care. Featuring three guest experts, Dr. Rebecka Peebles, Renee Reinecke, Ph.D., and Katie Maki, RN. You will come away from this course ready and confident to support adolescents and families who need your help.
Course Highlights:
- A course created by a seasoned duo, Lauren Muhlheim, Psy.D., author of When Your Teen Has an Eating Disorder, and Katie Grubiak, RDN
- Aims to educate and empower dietitians who work with adolescents and aspire to integrate elements of FBT into their practices
- Explicitly teaches a weight-inclusive approach to eating disorder treatment
- Completely redesigned and updated curriculum adding on to our original version of Working with Adolescents (2019)
- Special attention on best practices for returning individuals to their estimated growth curve and identifying target weights
- Includes perspective and lessons from Katie Maki, RN, a parent with lived experience of supporting her child with an eating disorder
- Self-paced learning modules as well as live sessions with Q & A
- 20 CE Credits for dietitians (pending approval from CDR)
“As a parent, I can relate to parents’ terror in dealing with these devastating illnesses. Empowering families to help their children recover at home, rather than sending them away to be “fixed” by someone else, is my work’s greatest reward.”
– Lauren Muhlheim, Psy.D., CEDS
Lead Instructors
Guest Speakers
Rebecka Peebles, MD
Returning to growth curve from a medical standpoint
Renee Rienecke, PhD
Research update on FBT evidence base
Course Outline and Modules:
Module 1: Working with Adolescents and Eating Disorders
5 Core FBT Principles
How to Prioritize Those Principles in Adolescent ED Treatment
Teen DevelopmentModule 2: Overview of FBT
Anosognosia
Parental leverage
FBT – 3 Phases
Markers of recoveryModule 3: Renee Rienecke, PhD - Family Based Treatment: Then and Now
Overview of the history and development of FBT
Findings and significance of seminal research studies
A look at recent FBT research
Adaptations to FBT for disorders such as bulimia nervosa and ARFIDModule 4: Rebecka Peebles, MD - A medical standpoint on returning teens to their growth curves
Module 5: Myths About FBT, Who is FBT For, and Important Considerations
How to know who is a good fit for FBT and who may not be
Addressing economically disadvantaged families in FBT
Supporting ethnically diverse families
Adaptations for adults
Helping teens with Atypical Anorexia
FBT for ARFID
Case examplesModule 6: Team Roles Within FBT
Who is on an FBT Team
Overlapping roles on a team
Role of RDN in different phasesTeam coordination and leading the team
Module 7: The RDN and Working with Teens – what we’ve learned from FBT
Setting Goal weights
Faster feeding (higher caloric goals)
Empowering parents to feed
Permission to not meet with teen directly
Screening for refeeding syndrome
Protocol options for weighing
Coordination of medical monitoringModule 8: Empowering Parents to Feed
What meal planning approach to use and the pros and cons of meal plans
Using food photos and other technology
Increasing Caloric Density
Using Incentives
Use of Supplements
Transitioning to Phase 2Module 9: FBT Challenges
Return to sport guidelines in FBT
Split families, divorced families, busy families, parents not on same page
When weight gain stalls
When original weight target seems inadequate
Family empowered care at higher level of care
College readiness including assessment, preparation, and contracts
Camps and travel
Body image
Non-FBT supporting treatment centersModule 10: Calculating Estimated Target Weight-for-Age
Learn how to use the 7-step worksheet to calculate mid-parental height with growth data to find an estimated target weight for age introduced by Dr. Peebles in Module 4.
Module 11: The Mamabear approach in eating disorders for full nutritional recovery of both body and brain. How registered dietitians can be a caregivers most significant asset.
Learn how one expert-by-experience, mother, and nurse leveraged her unique skill set to save her child from an eating disorder diagnosis at age ten (now twenty-two in full recovery for many years). This live session will offer a comprehensive understanding from a caregiver’s perspective of what registered dietitians working in Family Based Treatment need to know to support families.
Speaker: Katie Maki